Alert on red dye used in chutneys
A cancer-causing dye has been found in chilli powder used in chutney and relish, the Food Standards Agency said. The red dye, Sudan I, has been found in chilli powder imported from India. It is banned from food and is normally used in petrol, shoe polish and solvents.
Brands containing the contaminated chilli have been removed from sale. It has been found in 14 products made by Shaws Ltd, of Huddersfield, and in ten by B.E. International Foods, of Enfield, North London, sold under the Rajah label.
Drunk pupils disrupting classes
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Under-age drinking is causing a growing number of pupils to miss lessons or be disruptive. A schools survey found a “huge problem” of lunchtime binges, vomiting and hangovers. It tallies with findings that the amount drunk by 11 to 15-year-olds has almost doubled in ten years. Nick Tegerdine, of the Nottingham Alcohol Problems Advisory Service, who conducted the survey of the county, said it was not just secondary schools reporting problems:
“There are concerns about top-age primary pupils hanging around with secondary pupils who drink at lunchtimes.”
Road to safety
Children who live in urban homes built before the 1960s are far more likely to be killed or injured in a road accident than those who live in modern housing, a study at Surrey University has found. Modern estates are usually designed around a series of cul-de-sacs with far fewer dangerous junctions, it said.
‘Ecstasy death’
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A teenager has collapsed and died after apparently taking Ecstasy with a group of friends. Ben Henessy, 15, from St Albans, Hertfordshire, died at Hemel Hempstead General Hospital on Wednesday. A 16-year-old boy from St Albans has been arrested on suspicion of supplying an illegal substance.
Children at risk
Tens of thousands of children are placing their lives at risk by not learning to swim properly. A survey of 11-year-olds conducted by The Times Educational Supplement, has found that one in six of them is unable to swim a distance of 25 metres. About 50 children under the age of 16 drown each year.
Undercover fake
A man who posed as an undercover RUC officer to impress a woman was given 240 hours’ community service. James Butler, 40, began the masquerade in 1995. He pleaded guilty at Ballymena Magistrates’ Court, Co Antrim, to a string of charges including the theft of uniforms and notebooks.
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Sitting tenant
A £525,0000 house for sale in Edinburgh’s Morningside district is offered with a resident 60-year-old tortoise, Tortie, who lives in a compost heap. The owners, Monica Gibb, an actress, and her husband David Graveson, a businessman, feared that moving their pet would be too much of a shock for him.
Tube violence up
The number of reported assaults on the London Underground rose by a third last year to 1,880, with an average of five violent crimes committed on the network each day. Overall crime on the Tube rose by 27 per cent to 18,141 incidents, with pickpocketing, criminal damage and public disorder showing the biggest increases.
Medicines bill
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The cost of prescriptions dispensed in England rose to £6.8 billion last year, an increase of 8.5 per cent on 2001. A total of 617 million items were handed out by the NHS, up by 5.1 per cent on the previous year, the Health Department said. The net cost of ingredients per item rose to £11.10, an increase of 3.2 per cent.
£1bn benefit loss
Overpayment of income support and jobseeker’s allowance in the year to the end of last September cost £1.15 billion, the Office for National Statistics said. The figure represented a 26 per cent fall in fraud and error since 1998 and compared with targets of a 10 per cent reduction by March last year and 33 per cent by next March.
High sentence
Shane Collins, 41, the Green Party’s drugs spokesman, was jailed for six weeks after admitting cultivating and possessing 19 cannabis plants at his home in Brixton, South London. He plans to appeal against the length of the sentence. A party spokesman described the jail term as “ridiculous”, adding that the law was in need of reform.
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Drink driver jailed
Carole Watkins, 44, of Redcar, North Yorkshire, who crashed a car carrying eight people, three in the boot, after drinking two large glasses of wine, was jailed for 30 months at Cardiff Crown Court. A young father died in the crash. After a wedding reception in Whitchurch she had decided that her husband was too drunk to drive.
Speed ruling
A speeding conviction for Dwight Yorke, the Blackburn Rovers footballer, was set aside by the High Court because he had not signed a police form stating that he was the driver. He had faced a £350 fine plus £1,000 costs after his Porsche was clocked at 61mph in a suburban street with a 40mph limit in Withington, Manchester.
Plea for disabled
The advertising industry is being urged by the Government to help to reduce public ignorance and prejudice against disability by featuring more people with disabilities in its campaigns. Maria Eagle, the Minister for Disabled People, said the Government would try to ensure that a fifth of its own campaigns used the disabled.
Holed in one
A suspected burglar found himself in trouble when he fled a crime scene — and ran straight into a police golf tournament. The 30-year-old man sped across the 13th fairway at Tapton Golf Course, near Chesterfield, Derbyshire, looking for a place to hide. He was instead confronted by 20 off-duty policemen.
Flights up
The number of people flying to the Western Isles has soared since Sunday flights were introduced last year. Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd said Stornoway, on Lewis, had experienced the fastest growth of any of its ten destinations in the past three months with a 22.2 per cent increase.
Bail refused
Andrea Bone, 20, jailed for three years at the High Court in Stonehaven last year for failing to prevent the murder of her daughter, lost her bid to be released pending an appeal. Sandy McClure, 27, who beat 13-month-old Carla-Nicole Bone to death at a cottage in Aberdeenshire, was jailed for life.
Celtic return
Celtic footballers, fans and journalists arrived home a day late after a terrifying experience when the pilot of the Britannia Boeing 757 they were on aborted take off at the last minute and slammed on the brakes. The team was returning from Lithuania after beating FBK Kaunas in the Champions League.